Another Trip to the Supreme Court—this time on Long-Arm Jurisdiction

This is a short story about the West Virginia Supreme Court and Jurisdiction. In 1991, I had only been out of law school for 4 years when a client approached me from New Jersey, informing me that they had a jury trial in West Virginia scheduled to determine her alimony. She had never been to West Virginia. 

So what?  This is a big deal. She had no time or money to litigate this issue miles away from home.  And she shouldn’t have to! The law requires that either the person or the subject of the lawsuit have "minimum contacts" with a state before the state can exercise power over them by requiring that they participate in litigation. This is called “personal jurisdiction” or “subject matter jurisdiction.” (When I provide free legal information during online meetings, I often have clients ask if they can file suit, particularly a divorce action, in Virginia or West Virginia when one or sometimes neither part resides in the state—but that’s another story.) 

In this case, Mr. and Mrs. Pries lived and worked in New Jersey, were divorced, and moved to West Virginia. He wanted his spousal support reduced. So, he filed for the modification, and the court issued the scheduling order, which included a trial.   

When Ms. Pries contacted me, I immediately reached out to her lawyer and then the judge, thinking that there must have been an error.  I filed a motion to dismiss.  Nothing.  In desperation, I filed for “extraordinary relief,” which means that it is something the Court usually won’t grant, but when something extraordinary has occurred—they might.  Fortunately, the Court required that the matter be stayed until it was reviewed by the court.  They scheduled, and we participated in oral arguments, which was always one of my favorite parts of litigation.  

A few months later, as it happened in those days, a huge envelope arrived at the office. I was stunned—I thought that this case was so simple that the Court would rule with a per curium opinion. (For those who are not lawyers, a per curium opinion is a brief opinion by an appellate court that simply affirms the law and states it. They are at most a few pages long, not signed, and are not considered to be legal precedent since they just confirm current law.)  

When I opened the envelope, I realized that the few weeks I spent in Civil Procedure studying the long arm statute were not a waste of time. The most famous appellate cases are memorable—Worldwide Volkswagon and International Shoe.  A long-arm statute provides courts in a state with jurisdiction over a person by reaching over a border whenever that person or company has what are called “minimum contacts” with the state. The Supreme Court determined that this case provided a good opportunity to announce how minimum contacts may be established, particularly in a spousal or child support matter.  Of course, since Ms. Pries had zero contact with West Virginia, the court concluded that they did not have jurisdiction, and the case filed by her former spouse was dismissed. 

This case was one of several trips I took to the state Supreme Court in the first ten years of my career. One of the biggest cases was described in this post when the court declared a statute unconstitutional.  Others included issues involving child abuse and neglect, filing for divorce pro se, and domestic violence. I anticipate writing posts on most of these decisions, so stay tuned!  

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